A variety of Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAVs) have been developed, including Remote Control (RC) planes for the hobbyists, and more advanced “drones” or UAVs. Various UAV configurations and features, including for example, various “quadcopter” or four-rotor configurations, have been developed for various hobby, commercial, or military applications.
As UAVs become more sophisticated and more easily accessible, unregulated use of UAVs may pose security, safety, and privacy concerns. For example, unregulated use of UAVs can include invasion of privacy, espionage, smuggling, and the like. In certain contexts, detection of UAVs can be challenging, given that UAVs can be much smaller than manned aircrafts, can fly at low altitudes, and can maneuver differently than manned aircrafts. Standard radar and other conventional technologies for detecting larger, manned aircrafts may not be well-suited for detecting UAVs. For example, pulsed radars cannot detect UAVs as the pulsed radars have a minimum range and resolution, severely limiting detection and identification of small UAVs. Some existing solutions, including micro-Synthetic Aperture Radar (SAR), Nano-SAR, and Miniature Radar Altimeter (MRA), were designed for remote sensing applications instead of detecting and identifying UAVs, and additional work is necessary before such solutions can be used reliably to detect small UAVs.